


strength

by sludgeraptor



Category: Life Is Strange (Video Game)
Genre: Emetophobia, F/F, Spoilers for episode 4, also spoilers for the whole game so far, when will ep 5 come out. when will my girls return from this hell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-01
Updated: 2015-09-01
Packaged: 2018-04-18 10:40:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4703021
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sludgeraptor/pseuds/sludgeraptor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You apologise silently to Chloe once more.</p><p>You apologise for not being strong.</p>
            </blockquote>





	strength

**Author's Note:**

> im sorry @ god

Chloe had always been something else, something special. You’d known that since you were little, since you’d met on the playgrounds and she’d grinned at you with her chipped tooth from falling on the rocks at the beach and your heart had skipped a beat, God knows why. She had said your freckles were cute, and you told her you liked her hair.

That moment is etched in your mind forever, the first time she’d ever spoken to you. You wish you’d had a photo. If not to go back, then just to reminisce more clearly. To have her so pure again - not that you didn’t love her now, of course - but to have her so… _happy_ again.

When you were ten she told you about truth or dare - or, more accurately, forced you into a game. Her eyes were lit up when she said _okay, now your turn_ and you’d felt your face go hot because no matter what Chloe would come up with you were going to be embarrassed. _Truth_ , you’d said. _Boooooring_ , she’d replied.

You guessed that even today, Chloe would’ve responded that way.

Your eyes flutter open and closed, but Chloe never leaves your mind. You think about when you were thirteen, when you went to the lighthouse, and William yelled at you. Chloe had told him something flippant, you don’t remember - but your father would’ve freaked out if you’d said it to him.

Chloe had, at one point, before William had died, told you she knew how to read palms. She had taken your hand in hers, traced a figure across your heart line, and made a thoughtful grunting noise. _What is it?_ you’d asked her, worried. She looked up at you, uncharacteristically serious, blonde hair falling down her shoulders and catching the sunset’s light from outside her room. You had swallowed hard, bit your lip.

 _It says_ , she said, cheeky grin forming, _that we’re going to get married one day._

 _Don’t be ridiculous!_ you’d snapped, pulling your hand back while she laughed.

Her laugh was like birdsong to you. A few days later, William died.

You didn’t hear that laughter again for five years.

You wonder, sometimes, if she remembers you urging her to forgive you. It was a guilt that was both preemptive and post-mortem, and you have to think that she must forgive you even a little more in this universe. You have to, because if you didn’t, the regret would eat you alive.

(Your faces crackled in the fire and you’d apologised over and over to her in your head for closing off this one opportunity to change things, but you remember the choice between killing her fast or slow and you know you can’t live with the option.)

Then you saw her again and even though she was so different something fundamental in her was the same, and you don’t know what it is but it made your heart practically burst with half forgotten love.

 _Chloe?_ you’d cried, and she’d said _Max?_ with just as much shock. Warren was still being beat up in the background, and yes, you were afraid, but somehow you weren’t terrified anymore.

When she’d asked you to kiss her a few days later your heart leapt in your chest and you grabbed her shoulders, remembering your heart line all those years ago, and pressed your lips to hers.

(You didn’t get to taste her, but she smelled acrid close up. Like smoke - like sadness.)

Chloe jumping away was expected, of course, even though you’d kind of hoped she would kiss you back. Maybe more than hoped. Maybe the kiss haunted your dreams. Maybe you wanted to do it again.

Maybe.

When she vomited over Rachel’s corpse and you held her close to her while she shook and sobbed _why, why, why,_ you wished that you’d been able to stop her sorrow.

( _What kind of world does this?_ , she’d said. _Who does this?_

Now, of course, you had your answer.)

You weren’t good enough for her. You knew that. Every time it’d become critical to save Chloe, from herself, from someone else, it’d seemed like you’d succeeded, until -

 _and her blood pooled around her body and you tried screaming but it came out weak,_ Chloe, Chloe, Chloe _, fading to nothingness in your throat when you saw_ him _above you and felt ready to be sick_

\- until you’d finally failed, when it really mattered.

She told you, in that other world, that she wouldn’t fall asleep on you - not yet. You knew now what she’d been alluding to, of course - but you couldn’t help but wonder if this was your destiny together. Her falling asleep on you halfway through the movie while you were left to watch the ending alone.

You force your eyes open, the cold, clinical room greeting your tired eyes.

 _Please,_ you say. _You don’t have to do this._

You want to fight back, to tell him exactly where he can shove his needle, but you’re afraid, and you’re ashamed of your fear. You want to be brave like her. You want to be angry like her. But all you feel in your stomach is a hot coil of shame weighed down by terror.

 _Please,_ you repeat, letting your eyes flutter closed again.

In your mind, Chloe is with you here. She is holding you. She tells you everything will be okay, and you believe her. You hold her hands - warm, alive - and she laughs, and you wonder why tears are dripping off your chin.

He says something and you force your eyes open again. Of course, the world is still cold, clinical, white. Of course, Chloe is still lying in the junkyard, blood pooling underneath her.

You apologise silently to Chloe once more.

You apologise for not being strong.

 

**Author's Note:**

> i might edit this more later idk its late


End file.
